Valparaiso Embraces Dark Fiber - Community Broadband Bits Podcast 199

When Valparaiso, Indiana looked into solutions for a business that needed better Internet connectivity than incumbent providers were willing to reasonably provide, it quickly found that many businesses were lacking the access they needed. The market was broken; this wasn't an isolated incident.

Correction: Lisa misspeaks in the intro, saying Valparaiso is northeast of Chicago. It is southeast.

Valparaiso General Counsel & Economic Development Director Patrick Lyp joins us to discuss what Valparaiso is doing to ensure its businesses have the access they need in episode 199 of the Community Broadband Bits podcast.

We discuss the need from local businesses and the dark fiber approach Valparaiso has started to encourage better choices in the ISP market. We also discuss the funding mechanism, which is tax-increment financing - a tool increasingly common in building dark fiber networks in Indiana.

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Of course there is the argument that government should stay out of the way when it comes to broadband. Sometimes it is easy to forget how much the private industry benefits when government steps in to provide or facilitate basic infrastructure. Private industry benefits tremendously from our road systems, reliable power infrastructure, clean water, sewer systems and public safety. A robust, ubiquitous high-speed broadband infrastructure will facilitate interactions between businesses, allows private industry to deliver new and innovative services to customers and allows employees to be productive where ever they are at.